Leading Republicans are proposing a new federal office that would crack down on racial discrimination against white and Asian applicants to colleges and universities. After working to end affirmative action in higher education, lawyers are now pushing to end the practice in the private sector as well. 

Senator Vance and Congressman Jim Banks unveiled the College Admissions Accountability Act on Tuesday. The proposal would establish an investigative office within the Department of Education that would ensure colleges and universities were in compliance with the Supreme Court decision that barred higher education from using race as a factor in admissions, Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard. 

Messrs. Vance and Banks told the Washington Free Beacon that schools that choose to ignore that decision would then lose federal funding. 

“Our university system has sadly shown a dedicated commitment to racial discrimination in admissions,” the senator wrote on X. “Today I proposed legislation to address this problem, and force our colleges to consider merit — and nothing else.” Mr. Banks wrote that his bill “would force universities to start respecting the Supreme Court and the Constitution and  stop racially discriminating once and for all!”

The bill would establish the Office of the Special Inspector General for Unlawful Discrimination in Higher Education. “Following the Court’s ruling, several American colleges and universities issued statements or unveiled new policies at odds with its letter and spirit,” the legislation states. “Institutions of higher education, including their offices of admission, must comply with the Constitution and laws of the United States, as interpreted by the judiciary.”

A prominent conservative activist known for challenging diversity efforts in corporations and higher education, Christopher Rufo, praised the legislation on Tuesday, saying it was “the first legislative proposal to fight back against rampant anti-white and anti-Asian discrimination in higher education.”

The man who led the charge to end affirmative action, Ed Blum, has now set his sights on the private sector, where he is hoping to end scholarships, fellowships, and positions that are limited to people based on the color of their skin. 

Mr. Blum, who leads the Project on Fair Representation, recently sued two major law firms for their special summer programs that discriminate on the basis of race. One lawsuit accuses the law firm Perkins Coie of “racially discriminating against future lawyers for decades.” The fellowships that Perkins Coie offers to first- and second-year law students, which only consider “students of color,” “students who identify as LGBTQ+,” and “students with disabilities,” are meant to “exclude certain applicants based on their skin color,” the lawsuits states. The legal brief also states the fellowships are “six-figure jobs.” 

“So between two heterosexual, nondisabled applicants — one black and one white — the latter cannot apply based solely on his race,” the lawsuit states. The challenge to Perkins Coie was filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas.